


to raise you [until you can fly]

by AcidIssue



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Canon Compliant, Dad Egbert dies, Family, Father-Son Relationship, Fatherhood, Gen, Grandpa Harley dies, Growing Up, Minor Injuries, Nanna Egbert dies, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Wakes & Funerals, eventually, the other kids and guardians will make cameos later
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-06
Updated: 2021-03-06
Packaged: 2021-03-12 02:20:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,971
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29877609
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AcidIssue/pseuds/AcidIssue
Summary: Being a father is harder than you assumed it would be.But it’s also more rewarding than you ever imagined.Mister Egbert loses his mother on the same day he gains a son, a son who dropped from the sky and brought a book from the future and who will create a new universe one day._________________________________________________________________This is the story of Mister Egbert raising John, a story about parenthood and running out of time.
Relationships: Dad Egbert & John Egbert
Comments: 2
Kudos: 14





	to raise you [until you can fly]

**Author's Note:**

> Basically, Dad Egbert is one of my top 5 Homestuck characters because of how kind he is; and I could write essays about how he took a weird baby from space and didn't despair or made it into a soldier, but instead poured as much love as he could into raising John.  
> Instead, I wrote a fanfiction. 
> 
> All deaths are canon-compliant, but because Dadbert is the focal character here, I thought warnings might apply; please let me know if anything else needs to be tagged! 
> 
> Lastly, much thanks to my lovely beta-reader, codedredalert, for editing and helpful tips!  
> _________________________________

Being a father is harder than you assumed it would be. 

But it’s also more rewarding than you ever imagined. 

  
  


\---

When you first saw your son, it was in the middle of a smoking crater. He sat on an old, weather-worn, ancient tome, on top of your own mother — she was shot down by a meteor, merciless and unstoppable, as if aiming directly for her. The same meteor that brought the child and the book here. 

You know you should have been more upset. 

But he looked so small— staring up at you, eyes even bluer than your mother’s— and looking so similar to her for reasons you only began to understand years later. 

He looked up at you and gave you a toothless smile and a giggle, his stubby little arms reaching for you. He could wrap his whole hand around a single one of your fingers, and when he held onto you, it dawned on you that this was not some cruel twist of fate, but a child, by himself. You couldn't leave him there by himself. 

You’d almost forgotten about the lady in the pink scarf, but the smell of her perfume kept lingering. 

\---

Your mother’s funeral is only a few days later, and you think she looks like she is sleeping and forgot to take off her oval glasses, and you swear you can still hear her laugh.  _ Hoo hoo hoo.  _

John, of course, is with you; you couldn’t find a babysitter on such a short notice, not that you’d know where to even look for one. You also haven’t picked up a stroller yet; they told you the order would take a while since it’s not what Dad Depot usually has in stock. 

So you stand there, at your mother’s funeral, holding this child — he barely weighs anything, you register, and you can hold him with one hand — and somewhere beneath your detached numbness, you’re afraid you could hurt him. It’s the only thing you feel strongly about today.

So you stand there, at your mother’s funeral, holding this child in one arm, feeling detached and numb and vaguely worried, and you marvel at the fact that stories lied to you about funerals and rain. This funeral is almost offensively sunny, as if trying to play a prank on you. You pull the brim of your hat down over your eyes with your free hand. 

There are questions, of course. You tell them he’s your uncle’s daughter’s brother’s child, and that you are taking care of him; you tell them that you don’t know what happened, it was a freak accident. You tell them it was so fast, and agree that the funeral director did a great job making her look nice, you tell them you’ll raise him by yourself for the time being, you tell them you’re still busy with the paperwork, yes, for both. You agree the flower arrangements are elegant and subtle and nice, for the occasion, of course, and what a shame it is she died so suddenly, and you agree that the child is so well-behaved, and quiet, and you say you didn’t find a babysitter yet. 

Between the questions and the paperwork, you cannot find the time to grieve. 

\---

You put the urn with her ashes on the mantle of the fireplace. It’s a light cyan colour, her favourite, and it reminds you of the sky. 

John has been sleeping in your bed for the days between the death and the funeral, and these days after, you’ve been busy setting up a crib for him — it has bars. Why does it have bars? — and all that comes with it. You’ve decided on bedsheets in blue, a dark blue, and you’ve put a mobile above it with little ghost pendants. It moves slightly, and you like to imagine John invites the breeze in himself to make the ghosts dance because he laughs when they do. The sound fills you with warmth, and you almost feel yourself smile. 

You’ve learned how to change diapers, and you’ve gotten a lot of advice not to buy tons of baby clothes since they outgrow them so fast, and many other such tips from the gents at your office. You’ve stocked up on baby formula, and you’ve set up a doctor’s appointment, both general and optometrist. You’re in talks to make adjustments to work from home with your boss, and you’re realising there is so much you have to learn about taking care of babies. 

Before you know it, dust has settled thickly on your mother’s urn. 

\---

You make sure John is fast asleep, curled up in his crib and breathing softly, and still so small, before you settle down for the night yourself. You leave his door open just a little, so you can hear him if he needs you. It’s dark downstairs, and only the streetlights outside illuminate the living room just enough to see. You see a hint of cyan glint in the darkness, and instead of heading to bed, you head towards it.

What’s left of your mother stands undisturbed. You reach out to take the urn, since you should really dust it off, but it seems your body has other plans. 

You brace your hand against the fireplace because if you don't, you might drop down on your knees. When you take your pipe out of your mouth, your hand shakes so badly you spill different ashes on the floor. (Not your mother’s. You couldn’t do that to her.) The shaking moves from your hands up into your arms and settles in your shoulders, evolving into silent sobs. You lost your mother, and the hole she left is bigger than the physical crater on the edge of the city. You gained a child, and it’s the only thing you’ve felt anything about in these days, no, weeks, no, months since her funeral. 

It’s the first night since her death that the rest of the fog smothering you seems to lift, and you become acutely aware of the world around you again. 

It’s the night you decide to take a look at the book he brought with him.

\---

You’d recognise your mother’s handwriting anywhere. At least, you got the boy’s name right. 

How could she have known? It would almost feel like another prank, if it weren't so jarring. It sounds like she knew of her death too. 

Your legs are starting to grow tingly from having Colonel Sassacre’s tome resting on them for so long, but you barely feel it compared to the weight of what you just read.

Kernelsprites? Agents and Exiles? Warring royalty? 

Witches and knights and seers and heirs? 

You don’t understand, and it worries you, and you’d ignore it under any other circumstances.

But John fell from the sky right in front of you, so you’re willing to give the benefit of doubt. 

You take another drag from your pipe. You read the sentences again. 

_ Dear John,  _

You hear crying from his room. It’s like a static shock running down your spine, and you are up the stairs, taking two steps at a time before you even register it consciously. 

He’s lying on his side, free from his blanket, and his cries are shrill. The sound breaks your heart and he’s reaching out for you once you are standing right beside him. In the back of your mind, you think he should have recognised you sooner, and you can’t wait to see the optometrist.

His diaper is still dry, and he doesn’t seem hungry; in fact, he quiets down immediately once you hold him in your arms. Your hand covers almost his entire back. His hands are kneading the front of your dress shirt, and you don’t mind that he’s getting snot all over it. This tiny, living being only has you, and as you hold him and stroke his back and rock him slightly and talk to him quietly, he slowly dozes off again.

_ John, if only you knew how important you were!  _

You don’t know how you would have handled the past few weeks without having a child to keep you grounded. When he smiles at you, it feels like the most important thing in the world. It’s like your heart starts beating again after it stopped. It feels like a splash of colour between the grey of your office and the white walls of your house and the black of mourning. He’s sleeping soundly against your chest, and you realise that there is no way you could have left him out there by himself. 

There is no way you could let go of him now. 

Your mother’s writing rings in your ears as if she spoke to you directly. 

_ Though I suppose that will be up to your Father.  _

It still feels strange to think of this child, of John, as your son in particular, but you find that you don’t mind. In fact, it makes your heart swell with pride, and you don’t know when you started smiling. You wonder if he, too, will be a prankster when he grows up. 

_ Perhaps he will discuss it with you one day, when you and he are ready.  _

You silently apologise to your mother. You don’t know when that day will be. But until then, you’ll keep this book locked up in your safe, right next to your own pristine heirloom and your copy of Harry Anderson’s “Wise Guy”. You’ll hand one of those to John sooner than the other, probably. 

_ Until then, John, I do hope your Father keeps you well fed!  _

You sent a quick, silent prayer of gratitude to VHS cooking classes and Betty Crocker. 

That, you can do. 

\---

Your window is open a crack, and you can smell freshly cut grass and the sweet aroma of flowers, mingled with blacktop bite and faint city smog from outside. Spring is in full force, and you’ve planted new flowers in the garden with John grabbing eagerly at the soil and tearing at grass blades and generally marvelling at the outside world. Plants are unyieldingly growing and blooming and living, as if the dreariness of the past year never happened; and you, too, feel happier, more alive, and when you think of John — think of your son — there’s a warmth in your chest. It’s like you are breaking through soil yourself, although in your case, it might as well be graveyard soil. A part of you died with your mother. A different part of you is vibrantly alive.

Most of your thoughts come back to your son now. 

You take a drag of your pipe, soft jazzy tunes drowning out the faint roar of engines on the highway. You've gotten temporary guardianship before, but now, finally, you are opting for actual adoption. The paperwork in front of you is demanding. They are asking about a stable income, and your office job provides that; they are asking for a stable home, and you can provide that too. You know they are less likely to allow single parents. You have to try anyway.

It’s not an option to just give John to another family, or an orphanage, and the thought makes your blood run cold — would someone else have noticed he needs glasses? Would they notice that he likes the colour blue, and that he laughs when you act goofy, and that he’s starting to grow his teeth? 

Besides, you’ve already renovated so much to make space for him, in your home and in your life, and you can’t just… undo that. 

And that’s not even mentioning what you read in the book. There was a letter from your mother addressed to John, and it spoke of kingdoms and magic and battle, of war and knights and witches, and of you being John’s father. John is your son; there is no way you can let someone else take him. (You also think about how empty your house would feel.) You’ll have to look into that letter; but you don’t even know where to start. It’s not like babies falling from the sky get reported in the news a lot. (But meteors do. There’s been three in the winter before John came to you.) But first, you have to get these adoption papers filled in, and you have to — you need to — get them approved. A daunting task. 

You set aside your pipe and call Uncle Harley. 

  
  


\---

You’re in the kitchen when it happens. 

You decided to try making frosting from scratch, because it’s easier to colour, and because you found some good beginner’s recipes. You were wondering what your mother would say, seeing you in the kitchen and baking, and you thought she’d laugh and make cookies and probably dote on John. 

You’ll have to pick up the slack. 

Soon, you’ll hopefully have your cake setting in the fridge, a light blue (not cyan. not yet.) frosting covering a fluffy pillow of vanilla and sprinkles. You haven’t tried this cake mix before, and you had hoped your son would like it. 

You don’t register that you dropped the bowl when you hear him yell. 

Your heart is racing as you move to the door. At the same time, your heart has stopped; a shard of ice in your chest, spreading and growing and making your shoulders tense up. You know today is a day of low traffic. You know there are no monsters outside; no little ones, no eldritch ones, no implings and no big black dogs. There’s a tire swing, and a green pogo ride, and sometimes the kids from around the corner, and yet, you are scared.

You pause, hand on the door handle.

You take a deep breath. Try relaxing your shoulders. Try straightening you back. You take a drag from your pipe. If you are panicking, he will get scared. 

As you step outside, your steps are firm and you move swiftly, but calmly. John is curled up on the ground, holding his knee. The sharp, icy splinters in your chest dig themselves a little deeper. You crouch down next to him, get him to sit up, rest a hand on his shoulder. He’s sobbing, rubbing at his eyes, shoving up his glasses to do so. 

“Hey," you say. It doesn’t sound right.

“Son," you try again, giving his shoulder a squeeze, “what happened?” 

That gets him to look up at you, and to stop sobbing. It also feels like someone punched you in the gut, seeing his face like that. 

He tells you that he fell, and looks at you and at the offending green ghostly pogo ride and back at his palms and knees, and you nod sternly, and tell him to let you see it. His knee is scraped open; where skin is supposed to be, there’s just a patch of crimson, and you can see some droplets of blood form. Dirt and grass cling to the edge of the wound. There’s another scrape on his palm, near his wrist, and it’s so caked in dirt that it’s hard to tell how big it is. It looks painful, and you feel lost; you’re still new to this. Letting him just sit there worsens the seizing in your chest, and you’re confused: rationally, you know scrapes aren’t dangerous, and yet, you can feel your own heartbeat pulsing in your ears. 

You, however, will have to remain collected. If you don’t, you might upset John even further. You read that somewhere about horses, and it’s the only thing you have to go on for now. 

\---  


You briefly considered just picking him up and getting him back inside, but on second thought, that strikes you as overly cautious. You don’t want him to grow up scared of the world, and if you make things worse than they are — 

— you are supposed to take care of him. You are determined to do so. 

So instead, you pull him up to his feet, and lead him back inside to the bathroom, and grab a clean washcloth, and scissors, disinfectant, band-aids from the first aid kit. The scrapes look… better? Less bad with all the dirt and grass cleaned off, and you explain to him what you are doing. 

Getting hurt, you say, is part of growing up, and so is being ok again. You tell him it’s an important step towards becoming an adult. He only winces a little when you disinfect the wounds. He’s being very brave, you tell him, putting up with it like this, and pulling himself up like this, and you tell him you’re proud of him. You mean it. 

He still looks solemn. The only band-aids you have are skin-coloured, practical and plain and not very fun. You make a mental note to get more colourful ones. 

In a fit of inspiration, you pretend to pull a band-aid from behind his ear; a party trick, a sleight of hand you haven’t done in years, but it does the job. His eyes go big as he stares at you in awe, pain all but forgotten, and asks you how you did that. It’s a trickster secret, you say; and only the best get to learn it. It adds extra magic to the band-aid, you say, and will make him get better faster. By the time you say “There. All done”, he’s beaming at you. Something in your chest twinges again, but this time, it’s warm and happy and you reach out to ruffle his hair. He’s got to wash off the remaining stains of dirt and grass, and you, you’ve got a kitchen to clean up. You probably need a new bowl. 

Once you are alone with your thoughts and the blue splatter all over your kitchen floor, you decide that you never, never want to see John hurt again. 

**Author's Note:**

> So, first chapter is done! I have three currently planned, so keep an eye out for updates. 
> 
> Thank all of you for your support!! <3


End file.
